Waste rubber
 

While collecting a pile of waste rubber after cutting and mounting my newest stamp sets, I wonder if anyone has ever thought of a way to use this waste? Or how to recycle it?

I use them as dimensionals on my cards if I want a particular piece of the card to "pop" a little. You can peel the rubber off the foam and stick that to your object and then peel off the paper backing and use that sticky side to attach it to your card. Give that a try!

My kids like to make "architecture" out of it. I use the bigger pieces to make small shadow stamps--like using craft foam. The smaller pieces I have heated a bit and removed the rubber and used as dimensionals. I do that if I am need of lots of dimensionals.

Annette
http://stamponthis.com

I use my extra rubber scraps to make background stamps!!

My hubby works with wood as his hobby, so he has cut out the same approx size of the wood blocks SU sends with their backgrounds stamps. Then I just start filling up a wood block---they each turn out differently!! My customers also do this now :lol: and I will give them away as I fill up a block :wink: You could also do smaller sizes too!!

I have one customer who makes her own background stamps, pretty cool. My kids love to plaster them all over cardstock as a piece of art. One of my kids made his own helicopter stamp with them. I use them as dimensionals.

I have used a pieceof rubber on my fiskars rotary cutter as an additional guide for cutting assembly line projects

I used to save them for dimensionals and background makers, but I ended up with bags and bags of them. Now I throw them out unless they're a pretty large piece. It's part of my plan to declutter my spaces.

If I find that I need a piece of rubber, I use part of a big piece or order a new stamp set :wink:

I have a ziplock bag of scarps if anyone is interested. I keep saying that I will use it & in 5 years as a demo I have not used it ONCE! lol

Let me know....

I just got out my bag of scraps & used a piece! lol!
I have the set "Love without End" and I wished that they would have made a plain circle to go inside the flower along with the two that have words. So I made my own! I just pulled a piece of scrap rubber from the cushion. Then I stretched it a bit so it would thin out a little and slipped it into one of my Marvy circle punches. It punched out very easily. Then I just stuck it back on the cushion and trimmed the cushion around it. Then stuck my circle onto the side of one of the blocks. Worked great! You could punch all kinds of shapes. :D

They make great snowman noses!

An artist named Karen Hill made a stamp of her own hand with all the scrap pieces, it was very cool looking! I couldn't find her original card made with the hand stamp, but I did find a CASE of it:

http://www.patstamps.com/Peace_on_Earth.html

I thought it was very original!

I copied cookiestamper and made a solid circle for Love Without End, thanks so much!

I have taken scraps -- various sizes and shapes -- and applied them to EZ Mount to make mosaic (or stone look-alike) background stamps. Very cool!

Regina

I am going to have to do this. It is a great idea! I have a large bag of scraps that I am saving for a special project (to be determined later) :oops:

OOh..good ideas. I never thought of saving them. Thanks for the ideas! I want my own background stamp now. :D

~~Jaala~~

I used some of my scraps to make blocks that fit in the blocks of the background stamp "Geometric". My kids also love playing with them.

Pam

http://gallery.splitcoaststampers.co...cat=500&page=3

Here is one thing I did with my extra rubber.
I have also created background stamps with it.
:D
Maybe we need a scrap rubber challenge!

Yes, Yes!!! A scrap rubber challenge - I second the motion!

I just sorted my 3 ice cream buckets of scrap rubber into one bucket of very good-sized pieces of rubber... and now I was wondering what to do with them. Those who have made background stamps - would you mind posting a pic for us who are not quite as creative?

Thank you for the Love Without End circle tip! I also have been wishing for a plain circle ... I'm not always thankful or in love with the person I make a card for!

Rebecca

I will get them scanned tomorrow and post them.

I made my neighbor (she farms too) a cow spotted background stamp out of my scraps, and one for myself too, just can't find mine ;) I also had some spare pieces with me so I gave a piece to all my guests at my Open House and let them see how great our Craft & Rubber scissors was. They all couldn't believe how easy it cut that rubber ;) Now it is on their wish list for the next time they order ;)

I would have never thought of making my own background stamp. DH has some extra wood in the garage, I'll have to go searching for a piece to make my own!

I use the straight pieces and cut them to size to make shaker boxes. Works well and it seems to give more lift than the double sided mounting tape that many people use.

Crystal

That's a fantastic idea... I'm going to try that next time I make a shaker box.

I usually use mine to show workshop guests how great the craft sissors are, someone else mentioned that before.

Oh, and I forgot.....
I made shadows for all of my stamps in the set "The Fine Print". And then I mounted them on the side of the blocks.
If I remember correctly, I stamped with the black onto a piece of acetate and then laid my rubber down onto it to transfer the ink to the rubber. (I didn't stamp onto the rubber because then the image would be backwards). Then I just cut the rubber out slightly inside the lines (or inside the words for the package). It didn't do the bee stamp, though.